Japan’s Confirms Okayama Bird Flu Case as H5 Strain (Update1) (Bloomberg.com) Jan. 29 (Bloomberg) -- Japan confirmed its third outbreak this year of bird flu after officials in the western prefecture of Okayama said the H5 strain of avian influenza was found on a local poultry farm. [News Source]

Japan confirms third bird flu case this month (ABS-CBNNEWS.com) TOKYO - Japanese authorities on Monday confirmed a third outbreak of bird flu this month, amid growing fears the avian influenza could spread further. [News Source]

Japan confirms third bird flu case this month (INQ7.net) TOKYO -- Japanese authorities Monday confirmed a third outbreak of bird flu this month, amid growing fears the avian influenza could spread further. Some 40 chickens have been found dead since last week at a poultry farm in Takahashi, Okayama prefecture, 550 kilometers (340 miles) west of Tokyo. [News Source]

Japan’s Okayama Prefecture Confirms Bird Flu Case as H5 Strain (Bloomberg.com) Jan. 29 (Bloomberg) -- Japan confirmed its third case this year of bird flu after officials in the western prefecture of Okayama said the H5 strain of avian influenza was found on a local poultry farm. [News Source]

Japan confirms H5 strain in 3rd bird flu outbreak (People’s Daily) A local government in Japan confirmed Monday that the third case of bird flu outbreak within the month involved the highly virulent H5 strain of avian influenza, Kyodo News said. [News Source]

No bird flu outbreaks among poultry reported in China for 127 days (People’s Daily) No outbreaks of bird flu among poultry have been reported in China for 127 straight days since Sept. 20 last year, said Minister of Agriculture Sun Zhengcai in Beijing on Sunday. [News Source]

Highly virulent bird flu virus confirmed at Okayama chicken farm (Kyodo via Yahoo! Asia News) _ The Okayama prefectural government said Monday that the highly virulent H5 strain of avian flu virus has been confirmed at a poultry farm in the city of Takahashi, Okayama Prefecture, where dozens of birds died in the past few days. [News Source]

Chicken farm in Japan disinfected for suspected bird flu (AFP via Yahoo! News) Health officials disinfected a chicken farm in western Japan, the day after it was placed under surveillance as a suspected fresh case of bird flu. [News Source]

Thousands to test flu emergency response. The government is to conduct the largest emergency exercise since the cold war on Tuesday to test whether it could cope in the event of a bird flu epidemic in Britain. [News Source]

Fighting the bird flu, fast. A couple of experimental bird flu vaccines in clinical trials can be made much more swiftly than the conventional influenza vaccines we get shots of each flu season. One approach entails using cells in a lab fermenter to quickly churn out the viruses needed to make a vaccine. [News Source]

A vaccine development ‘renaissance’. Breakthroughs in technology, increased funding and higher profits are spurring a boom in vaccine discovery and development that could save or improve the lives of millions of people by attacking such scourges as cancer and malaria. [News Source]